


Intro to Philosophy

by earthbourn



Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: And Obsidian said: only single beds exist, M/M, One spaceship two know-it-alls, Rivals to Lovers, pre-The Empty Man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-30 21:00:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21434623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earthbourn/pseuds/earthbourn
Summary: Max and Ezra both think they know everything, but they can't agree on anything. Sometimes, the only way to win an argument is to know your opponent.
Relationships: Male Captain/Maximillian DeSoto, The Captain/Maximillian DeSoto
Comments: 12
Kudos: 85





	Intro to Philosophy

Anyone would have said that Vicar Max and Captain Ezra would never tolerate each other. Too similar, though they’d never admit it. Even Nyoka said so:  _ Like two stuck-up pterorays squabbling over the same chunk of sprat _ . 

Between the vicar’s self-assured Scientism and the captain’s dogged nihilism, everything became a debate, from the dignity of domesticated boarst to the moral fallacies of tossball. When Ezra would tilt his head and grimace or Max would raise a finger, when either would interject with, “But consider this,” the rest of the crew would groan and look around for something to distract them from the lengthy argument they knew was coming.

The worst of the bickering stopped when Nyoka banned them from inhabiting the common areas of the Unreliable at the same time, but every excursion was still an opportunity for philosophical sparring. 

“If you really follow the Law’s will to power, shouldn’t you provoke that mantiqueen? Better yourself through struggle?”

“And you should let it kill me, since you think my life means nothing and morality doesn’t exist.”

The conversation ended there, after Felix fired on the mantiqueen himself, but Ezra was still thinking about it that night while he made notes in his journal. The vicar’s deep belief fascinated Ezra, that hubris to stare into a chaotic and uncaring void and say he could understand it, to take the corporations’ word on faith and call it science. 

It was late and the Unreliable was mostly quiet. Ezra took a walk round the ship, as he always did before bed, but he wasn’t sure what compelled him to stop at the vicar’s door. The man was a headache and a half, but somehow Ezra couldn’t resist prodding him, like a sore on the roof of his mouth. Max was bent over his books, thick shadows obscuring his face. What did he work on with such intensity, night after night? What new insights did he find in treading and retreading the same paths of thought that never satisfied?

Ezra’s light step in the doorway was his only greeting. “I never said your life means nothing  _ to me _ .”

Max didn’t look up until he finished the passage he was reading, and betrayed no surprise. “If you want to argue semantics, you may as well come in.”

“It’s not semantics unless  _ I _ mean nothing to  _ you _ .”

Max shook his head. “I can see this is going to take a while. Would you like a drink?”

“Shit, yes.” Ezra settled on the end of the bunk as Max retrieved a bottle of orange Spectrum from the bookshelf.

“I only have one glass, I’m afraid.”

“Can’t say I’ve ever had vodka from a glass anyway.” The citrus liquor burned nicely in his chest.

“You’re right. This isn’t exactly a refined event.” When Max tipped the bottle to his lips, Ezra watched Max’s throat work, then cursed himself. He should at least wait until he could blame the alcohol before acting like a damn fool.

Ezra pointed at the little bottle on Max’s desk. “What about that?”

“That’s my good whiskey. I’m not going to waste it on a man who wouldn’t know it from rocket fuel.”

“For once, I can’t fault your logic.” 

Max sat next to Ezra so they could pass the bottle more easily. For a while, they nursed an uncharacteristic silence, until Max finally said, “Is it really so strange to you that I find comfort in order?”

“Not strange. Just futile.” Ezra tilted the bottle back and forth and watched orange waves roll up the sides. “Because you don’t find it. Comfort or order, I mean.”

“How would you know that?”

“You can’t impose meaning where there is none. Life is cheap and short. Trying to make it otherwise just wastes what little you have.”

Max took the bottle, but didn’t drink from it. He stared at Ezra for a long moment. “There’s obviously no comfort in that view. Why try at all? Why get involved in petty injustices, or make friends with a bunch of misfits? Why even leave the stasis pod?”

Ezra shrugged. “Hedonism? Vanity? Maybe I’m hoping that I’m still asleep, and I’ll eventually wake up in a universe worth searching for meaning.”

“Cynical solipsism. That’s bleak, even for you.” He took a long pull from the bottle, smiled, and offered it back. “It’s hard to tell when you’re serious and when you’re just arguing for the sake of it.”

“I’m just saying that you…” Ezra lost track of his words for a moment and realized he was starting to feel drunk. “You’re an intelligent and capable man.” In the warm citrus glow coloring his thoughts, there was something endearing about the wrinkles on Max’s forehead when he raised his eyebrows. “You could do anything or be anything, if you didn’t let the OSI tell you what to do.” 

“I take guidance from my faith, but it doesn’t control me. My achievements, my goals, my desires...those are all mine.”

The severity of Max’s stare embarrassed Ezra, but he didn’t look away. “Prove it.”

When Max leaned toward him, Ezra’s heart jerked in his chest like a ship being yanked into a planet’s gravity. With his hand firm against the back of Ezra’s neck, Max’s kiss was rough, almost matter-of-fact; not scriptural, but scientific. Beneath the sharp scent of vodka, the bright hit of his sandalwood soap rushed right to Ezra’s head. Void damn him, of  _ course _ he smelled like the fresh robes and polished wood of a vestry.

Ezra reached for him, but the second his fingers brushed the deep blue fabric of Max’s cassock, Max pulled away. 

“Do you believe me now?” Max stood quickly and picked up the empty Spectrum bottle from the floor beside the bed. “Looks like we’re out. I suppose we’ll have to finish our discussion another time.” 

Over the next few days, the atmosphere between the two cooled, and Ezra couldn’t understand it. The vicar was as polite as ever, but seemed uninterested in their usual back-and-forth. Was he offended? Was he even capable of being embarrassed? The more Max ignored him, the more Ezra was determined not to show that it bothered him.

When Max stopped Ezra on his way through the kitchen and asked why his manner had changed, Ezra had a hard time keeping his expression impassive.

“I hope you don’t think I was rude,” Max said. “Believe it or not, that’s the most I’ve had to drink in quite a while.”

His conciliatory tone caught Ezra off guard. “No need to blame the booze, Vicar. I understand there are some arts you’re not an expert in.”

Max drummed his fingers on the table. “There are plenty of things you don’t know about me.”

“Somehow, I don’t think you learned how to conduct an  _ affaire de coeur _ in prison.” Immediately, Ezra wanted to yank out his own tongue. Why couldn’t he just talk normally around Max?

“Oh, is that what we’re doing?”

_ It was you who kissed me _ , Ezra wanted to say, but Max’s insufferable smile stopped him. “I thought you didn’t speak fucking French.”

Max answered with a little shrug and left Ezra alone.

The next night, Ezra couldn’t focus. He ended up scratching out everything he wrote in his journal, and was too irritated to make his rounds of the ship. If he had run into anyone on his walk, he would have probably been rude. Ruder than usual. 

Damn the vicar and his games. It wasn’t that Ezra was new to exchanges like this, but somehow Max kept him off-balance. He wasn’t accustomed to feeling stupid, and it made him furious. When a knock at his door interrupted his final attempt to vent on paper, Ezra flung his pen down, but didn’t look up. “The hell do you want?”

“My apologies. I didn’t know you were having an emotional moment.”

At first Ezra was glad it was only Max he’d snapped at, but then the implications of Max’s presence made his stomach twist up. “I said, what do you want?”

Again, that shrug that made Ezra want to punch him. “A drink?”

“I don’t have anything.” Stashed in his trunk was a jug of moonshine he’d picked up in Edgewater, but Ezra wasn’t about to let Max get him drunk and mess with him again.

“That’s fine.” Max stepped further inside and glanced all around the room. “The windows are nice, but I assumed at least the captain’s quarters would have a larger bed.”

Ezra didn’t take the bait. “If you came here for a reason, you’d better just say it. If not, then leave.” Ezra hoped he knew the reason, but he wouldn’t set himself up for embarrassment. What he wanted was probably a stupid mistake.

Max stood next to Ezra and laid his hand on the desk. “I came to say that I’ve noticed you staring at me.”

“You arrogant--”

“It’s not unwelcome.” Max idly flipped the pages of Ezra’s journal. “If you want me, you need only say so.”

_ This must be some sort of fetish for him _ , Ezra thought.  _ As soon as I admit it, he’ll leave. _ Ezra slid the journal away and said nothing.

“Is it so hard? Here, I’ll go first.” He brushed Ezra’s jaw with his fingertips, and Ezra forced himself not to shudder. “I want you,” Max said, and his voice seemed to travel up the back of Ezra’s neck. “Do you want me?”

“Yes,” Ezra said, but Max made no move. “Yes, dammit. I want you.”

“See what we can achieve when we don’t let pride get in the way? Haven’t you said that ego means nothing?”

Of course Max was still trying to debate, even now. “Just shut up.” Ezra pulled Max down onto his lap and kissed him, half-expecting Max to interrupt with another smart comment. When he made no protest, Ezra tugged open the buttons at Max’s collar. “How do you take this shit off?”

Max laughed. “I think it’s supposed to be difficult.”

“Then it suits you.”

After slipping off his cassock, Max pulled at the tie holding Ezra’s bun in place, but Ezra pushed his hand away. Max had never seen his hair down, and likely didn’t realize how long it was. Max leaned close so that his lips brushed Ezra’s ear. “Still so uptight.”

“Fuck you.”

“I was thinking the opposite,” Max said, his fingers trailing down Ezra’s sides, grazing his ribs. “Perhaps we could use the desk.”

Ezra put his hands over Max’s to halt them. “I don’t really do that.” This wasn’t strictly true; Ezra would occasionally subvert his preference, but he wasn’t comfortable enough with Max to do so.

If Max was surprised, he didn’t show it. “What do you suggest?”

The utilitarian design of the cabin didn’t leave many options. At least, not many that wouldn’t leave them both with backaches in the morning. “There’s one way we can both fit in the bed comfortably.”

Ezra didn’t face Max while he stripped, still conscious of inviting judgment. He stared at the ceiling while he waited for Max to lie down in his bunk, then realized Max was waiting for the same thing.

“It’ll have to be you,” Max said, his usual crooked smirk on his lips. “You’re taller.”

Ezra couldn’t argue that logic. It didn’t really matter anyway, except he was still convinced that ego was part of the vicar’s seduction game. But there was no hint of it when Max climbed carefully on top of him, conscious of where he put his knees and elbows, and dropped his head between Ezra’s legs. After a minute or two, Ezra finally relaxed enough that he forgot the antagonistic nature of the lead-up, and didn’t even care that he came first.

When Ezra shifted onto his side and made room for Max to lie next to him, he didn’t expect him to accept, but Max evidently wanted a moment to catch his breath.

Max brushed back the stray hairs that had fallen over his eyes. “What does nihilism have to say about that?”

“That you have no reason to be smug.”

“And yet, the will of man overcomes.” Max laughed and rolled out of the bunk to gather up his clothes.

Around the rest of the crew, Max’s behavior toward Ezra was unchanged, even after their activities became common knowledge. When SAM announced to all assembled that he’d laundered the seminal fluids from the captain’s bedsheets, Ezra choked on a bite of mock-apple and said he’d space that fucking heap of scrap if it was the last thing he did, but Max didn’t even look up from his book. They still argued, still grated on each other’s nerves, still took every opportunity to try and prove themselves the smarter.

In private, however, Ezra thought he detected a hint of tenderness in the way Max’s eyes would linger or his fingers trail thoughtfully across Ezra’s skin. Still, Max was careful not to say anything too compromising, even during sex. The closest he came to an affectionate word were the times he told Ezra to “just relax, for once, it won’t kill you.”

Ezra wasn’t usually one for hookups, simply because it wasn’t worth making himself vulnerable. But now he already had, and it was only getting worse. Eventually, he started to crave the intimacy more than the sex, the brief moments when they were both silent and the touches were gentle and Ezra didn’t feel the pressure to be better than he was. He called himself pathetic, foolish, out of his depth. Surely it was the height of idiocy to pursue a man who had so deliberately withheld his affection.

But Ezra would rather be alone than continue playing the fool, and it had always been his way to speak his mind, no matter how many relationships it cost him. So he waited until the ship was quiet, same as the first night he visited Max, and stood in the doorway until Max noticed he was there.

“I thought you’d still be awake.” Max’s smile was inviting, but also questioning. When they messed around on the ship, they never used Max’s cabin.

“I was thinking…”

“A worthy enterprise.”

Ezra sighed. If Max was going to interrupt every time he paused, he’d never make it through this. “Since we met, you’ve made me reconsider a lot of things. Even though I don’t agree with you, I admire your conviction. I want to have that kind of hope.”

Max blinked, brows raised, and snapped his book shut. “I appreciate you saying that.” He studied Ezra for a long moment. “Is that what you came to tell me?”

“No. I mean, not exactly.” Ezra shifted his weight from foot to foot, trying to find some posture that didn’t feel so painfully visible. “I don’t want to fool around anymore. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it’s more than that to me now. I don’t know what, exactly, but I’d like to find out. In the spirit of scientific inquiry.”

Max didn’t laugh at the joke. Ezra was sure this was the most inarticulate he’d ever been, but for once, Max was quiet, waiting patiently for him to continue. “I don’t care if telling you this means I lose that bullshit game we were playing. I’m tired of pretending I don’t like you.” 

Every one of Ezra’s heartbeats stabbed like an ice pick, but of course Max was perfectly silent now that Ezra needed him to fucking say something. Ezra finally decided to leave, gave Max an awkward nod, and turned toward the door, when Max told him to wait. 

“You’re right, it was bullshit,” Max said. “For all my talk of fate, I can never seem to resist hedging my bets.” He stood and returned the book to its place on the shelf. “But haven’t I said that truth should be sought wherever it might be found?”

“Don’t dress up sentiment as ‘truth.’ It’s beneath you.” Ezra closed the door and leaned his back against it. Slowly, the strangling tightness in his chest began to ease.

“You’ve had a lot to say about sentiment and meaning lately.” He ran his fingers over the volumes on the table by the door.

“I haven’t changed my position. No matter what I think, the universe still doesn’t care about you.”

Max folded his arms and tilted his head to the side. “Of course not. You’re stubborn  _ and  _ pedantic.”

Ezra reached out to touch Max’s collar. “You’re right. Now come here and let me teach you something.”


End file.
